


Medal

by nessatheresa12121



Category: Incredibles (Pixar Movies)
Genre: Angst, F/F, So much angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-26 17:08:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17145695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nessatheresa12121/pseuds/nessatheresa12121
Summary: Stratogale’s funeral, and Helen’s thoughts.





	Medal

They gave her the medal at the funeral.

Helen stared down at it, while the priest droned on and on. She was sitting in the front pew at the church; except for the eulogy, the room was so quiet that the smallest rustle of clothing could be heard. She couldn’t take her eyes away from that medal. Diamond-shaped, cool in her hands, it gleamed in her lap, a bronze contrast against her black velvet dress.

This medal was, technically, all that remained of Stratogale.

In the disintegration of the jet plane on its way down to the ground, everything had been incinerated. Some passengers’ remains had been recovered. Not those of Stratogale, the heroine who had given her life trying to save them. Gail and her super suit and all her flesh and bones had been shredded into a spray of gore, then crushed under the burning hunk of metal that was the former jet plane. The NSA would likely never find anything of her.

Nothing, that is, except this medal.

Two black-suited NSA agents had come to the funeral and soberly handed Helen the bronze medal without a word, and without any explanation, she knew. Gail had been awarded the medal in the eleventh grade at her high school’s award ceremony. She’d been awarded the prize to mark “excellence in volunteering.” It wasn’t much, but sweet Gail had prized it and taken it with her everywhere. Including into the skies.

Flesh and fabric were too weak to survive a plane accident, but not bronze. The school hasn’t skimped on the metal. There was nary a mark on it.

Helen shifted it slightly in her hands, letting it catch the light from the stained-glass windows and flash hard into her eyes. She would not cry. The sting in her eyes would hopefully prevent it. She’d always found that looking into a bright light was a good remedy for potential tears. Helen never showed her tears. She remained strong. Always.

The priest, in his stuffy robes and with his droning voice, wasn’t getting Gail right. Because he didn’t know her, dammit. Oh, he could wax poetic about Gail’s volunteer work or her love for animals or whatever other anecdotes her grieving parents had been able to give him. But could he talk about the unique, fluttering cadence of her laugh? The way she was afraid of snakes? How her lips felt against your own? What made her laugh? What made her angry? Anything that actually fucking mattered?

It was a stupid thing to be angry about, but Helen had to be angry about something. She wished to hell that she could’ve been allowed to give a eulogy, but as far as Gail’s family knew, she was just their daughter’s distant friend. Not her lover. If they’d known, who knew what the consequences would have been?

Helen wanted to scream it to the rafters. She wanted all of them to know the true extent of what Gail had been to her. Every. Single. One.

But she reined herself in. She remembered herself. Schooled herself.

Don’t scream. Don’t shout. Don’t cry. Don’t go back in time and fix all this, because you can’t, and wishing won’t make it better.

She wanted to feel Gail wrapped round and round in a loop of her arms again.

But it wouldn’t happen. So she had to try and forget.

**Author's Note:**

> I love this ship and I just wanted to write a short fic about it. Maybe I’ll write a longer one in the future. Hope you enjoyed the angst.


End file.
